Defining mediation

The question of mediation raises many issues since it entails a normative view about children's socialisation. How do media enter children's lives and who has responsibility for regulating their potential risks or benefits? Parents, teachers, policy makers and the media – all seem to have an opinion. However, the role of parents is prominent since most media use occurs within the home. Structural changes in family life ( James et al, 1998; Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, 2002) may explain certain transformations within family dynamics (from less to more ‘democratic’ styles of parenting) and account for changes in parental styles of mediating online activities (Eastin et al, 2006). Parents’ strategies toward media consumption reflect these dynamics and the family tensions and power relations that underlie the rules set and the way they are negotiated in different situations.

New media appear to undermine the effectiveness of some parental strategies through the individualisation and segmentation of media consumption within the home. There has been an emergence of ‘media-rich homes’ and a ‘bedroom culture’ among children and young people (Livingstone, 2002) and a tendency towards ‘living together separately’ (Flichy, 2002). The apparent contradiction that needs to be resolved is related to media uses within the family becoming increasingly segmented and individualised, but family socialisation in relation to media is still regarded as being crucial.

Although most authors agree that mediation involves some sort of effort to manage children's relations with media, they are not in complete agreement about what kinds of practices should be considered and how they should be classified (Livingstone and Helsper, 2008). Most theoretical discussions focus on parents, which harks back to their role in relation to traditional media (such as television; see, for example, Austin, 1990, 1993; Valkenburg et al, 1999; Nathanson, 2001a, 2001b). Mediation strategies regarding new media are still being explored (and adapted from previous research) although evidence on their effectiveness is scarce (Eastin et al, 2006; Livingstone and Helsper, 2008; Livingstone, 2009).

In discussing whether parental mediation of internet use can be analysed in the same terms as television, Livingstone and Helsper (2008) note that the conditions are obviously different.